Can't Stand the Heat

by Shelly Ellis

  “I’ve been trying to tell him,” Jamal interjected. “I already gave him the lowdown about the Gibbons family. He won’t listen!”

  “It’s understandable.” James gazed at Cris. “You haven’t lived here long. It’s hard to believe a group of women could be so mercenary.”

  “Mercenary? Lauren isn’t a mercenary! She’s got too much pride for that. And stop grouping her in with her sisters! She’s nothing like them! If you had—”

  “Is that what she told you? She’s more like her sisters than you know. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Lauren hadn’t tracked you down the instant she found out you were moving to Chesterton.” He tilted his head. “I kicked her out not too long before Thanksgiving. Did she tell you that, too? I would imagine she’s in need of a new boyfriend—a new benefactor, shall we say. It seems you fit the bill, my friend.”

  “I’m not your goddamn friend,” Cris said menacingly, making the flame of rage flicker in James’s eyes again. “My friends are real men, and no real man would do what you did to her!”

  Several eyes in the locker room widened in amazement. “Cris!” Jamal shouted. “Have you lost your damn mind? You can’t—”

  “Jamal, Cris is obviously under a dangerous female influence. Try to be more understanding. We’ve all fallen prey to it at some point in our lives.” James’s voice sounded calm, but his strained polite smile said differently. “But I would advise you, Cris, to be careful. I wouldn’t engage in any battles on Lauren’s behalf. She’s a good lay, but not that good. That gold-digging bitch really isn’t worth it.”

  At those words, Cris suddenly wanted to leap forward and pound James senseless. He took a menacing step toward James and Jamal instantly pressed his hand against his chest, shoving him back.

  It was Jamal and the other eyes in the locker room that stopped him. Besides, what would be his defense for beating James to a mangled pulp? No one knew about the abuse Lauren had suffered. As far as everyone in town would think, Cris was some deranged outsider who got violent with a respected member of the community for no apparent reason. Or worse, his anger was foolishly based on the word of a woman who almost no one in Chesterton trusted.

  No, despite his anger, despite the urge to make James feel what Lauren felt that night many months ago, Cris would have to tread carefully with this one.

  “Look, stay away from her,” Cris said through clenched teeth, pointing at James. “Just stay the hell away from her! If I find out you even touched her again, I’ll—”

  “No need for threats.” James’s smile widened into a Cheshire cat grin. “I don’t intend to seek out Miss Gibbons. Believe me. She’s all yours.”

  He was lying. Cris could tell. This was a man who was accustomed to getting what he wanted. He wouldn’t give up that easily.

  “Well, Jamal,” James said, “it was good seeing you again. I wish I could say it was a pleasure meeting you, too, Cris, but that would be disingenuous, now wouldn’t it?”

  Cris didn’t respond. Instead he continued to glower at James, still fighting the urge to smash his face into a million pieces.

  James slowly walked away and the mood in the locker room gradually lifted. Everyone no longer seemed to gaze at them with pent-up breath, anticipating something volatile. The buzz of conversation gradually returned. A few men across the room laughed at a joke. But Cris still felt his heart pounding rapidly in his chest and his fists were still clenched. He took a deep breath and slowly felt the tension inside of him ease.

  As James turned a corner and disappeared behind a row of lockers, Jamal reached out and grabbed Cris’s arm. He whipped his friend around to face him.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Jamal whispered.

  “You don’t know the full story, Jay. I know it seems like that came out of nowhere, but Lauren told me—”

  “And you’re going to take her word over his? See, this is why I didn’t want you to hook up with that . . . that . . . scheming hooker! I knew this shit would happen!”

  “Don’t call her a hooker! I told you that you don’t know all the details!”

  “To hell with your details!” Jamal slammed his locker closed. He raised the strap of his duffel bag over his shoulder. “I have a reputation around here, Cris! I introduce you to my friends and business associates and that’s how you treat them?”

  “Jay, I know you’re pissed. I know how it looks, but let’s go to the bar and have a drink. I’ll explain everything.”

  “I don’t wanna have a goddamn drink! I don’t want you to say shit to me!”

  “Oh, come on, Jay!”

  “Look, when you stop being pussy-whipped, give me a call, OK? Get your shit together! Until then, lose my number.”

  Cris watched in shock as Jamal marched off, pushing his way through a crowd of men who stood at the entrance of the locker room.

  Chapter 18

  Lauren paused from stirring her cake batter when she thought she heard a soft knock at her apartment door. She looked up from the glass bowl and glanced over her shoulder. She heard the knock again and lowered her spatula to her countertop before wiping her hands on the front of her apron.

  “I wonder who that is,” she muttered, glancing at the wall clock. It was fifteen minutes past ten.

  She hoped it wasn’t Cris. She had taken off a week from the restaurant and was enjoying her time with him, but their next date wasn’t until tomorrow. She had planned to finish the gourmet strawberry shortcake that Paula had given her the recipe for and bring it to Cris’s house. She hoped to surprise him with it, though he had said earlier that it was probably a good idea if she stopped making him so much food.

  “I think I’ve gained about ten pounds since we started going out,” he admitted with a laugh a few nights ago as he shoveled in another forkful of spaghetti that she had hand-pressed.

  But she couldn’t help it. It was her way of showing him how much she loved him. Because she did love him. She knew that now. She had believed for too many years that showing men affection could only be done with one’s body. Now she knew that was a lie. You could do it with words, a look, or even . . .

  “A cake,” she now whispered to herself as she walked toward her apartment’s front door. And it would be the best damn shortcake she would ever bake!

  Of course, Lauren wanted desperately to share her body with Cris, too, but for now, she would hold off on doing that. She wanted him to know he was different from all the rest. She wasn’t trying to manipulate him or trap him. She just wanted to love him, and she couldn’t show him that if she reverted to her old ways.

  Lauren pulled back the curtains over the two windowpanes in her front door. She stared in shock when she realized Cynthia’s daughter, Clarissa, was standing on her front stoop, barely discernable in the awnings’ shadows. She instantly unlocked the door and swung it open.

  “Clarissa, honey, what are you doing here?” she asked, frowning again—this time with concern—as she gazed at her niece. “Is your mama OK? Is everything all right?”

  Clarissa slowly raised her bowed head and timidly nodded. “Mama’s fine, Aunt Lauren. She’s on a date with some guy.”

  “So what’s wrong?” She took a step forward and scanned the girl’s face, instantly noticing Clarissa’s puffy, reddened eyes. “You don’t look good, honey. Have you been crying?”

  Clarissa didn’t answer. Instead she continued to stand near the stairs, shifting awkwardly from one foot to the other with one arm wrapped in front of her and the other hanging limply at her side. She anxiously gnawed her bottom lip. After what seemed like an eternity, she finally opened her mouth.

  “I’m sorry, Aunt Lauren. I didn’t . . . I mean, I didn’t want to . . . but I didn’t know where else to . . .” Her words faded as she lowered her gaze back to her feet.

  “What’s the matter, Ladybug?” Lauren whispered with a small smile. It was a question she had asked Clarissa many times when she was little, when the girl had seemed upset or sad.

  N
ow in response, Clarissa burst into tears, catching Lauren off guard.

  “Come inside.” Lauren quickly stepped onto the concrete and wrapped her arm around Clarissa’s trembling shoulders. She ushered her through the front door.

  Though Clarissa was almost a foot taller than her aunt, it didn’t take much effort to steer her toward the couch. The girl flopped onto one of the cushions as she continued to weep. Lauren sat down beside her.

  “I can’t do it! I can’t do it, Aunt Lauren!” Clarissa dropped her face into her hands. “And Mama can’t make me do it!”

  “You can’t do what, honey?” Lauren pulled Clarissa’s hands from his face to hear her more clearly.

  “Go . . . go out with him,” Clarissa said between sobs and hiccups. “He’s so old, Aunt Lauren! He’s like . . . almost thirty!” She cringed and shook her head, whipping her long dark hair around her face. “It’s so gross!”

  Lauren raised an eyebrow. She wasn’t aware that thirty years old was really that old and decrepit, but then again, she remembered this was coming from the mouth of a seventeen-year-old girl. Lauren remembered that when she was Clarissa’s age, anyone older than twenty-one seemed practically ancient.

  “Wait a minute,” a voice inside Lauren’s head suddenly shouted. “What’s this stuff about Cynthia making her go out with this guy? What’s that about?”

  “Your mother wants you to have a date with this man?” Clarissa wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. “Yeah, it’s supposed to be Saturday night. He works for one of her boyfriends. He wants to take me out to dinner. But Aunt Lauren, I don’t want to go! I told Mama I didn’t, but she’s making me go anyway. She said . . .” Clarissa sniffed. “She said that it’s . . . about time . . . I-I got some practice.”

  Lauren should have known this was coming. Cynthia could only teach Clarissa so long before “sending her out into the field” to gain experience, and it looked like that time had finally arrived. But it was so obvious that Clarissa wasn’t into this. She didn’t want to be like her mother, grandmother, or great-grandmother. She didn’t want to be a gold digger. Lauren could sympathize with Clarissa wholeheartedly. Maybe that’s why, out of all her aunts, Clarissa had chosen to come to Lauren for help.

  “Aunt Lauren, I swear, I will run away if she makes me go to dinner with that man! I’ll get on a Greyhound bus and go far away from here and no one will ever see me again!”

  “No, you won’t.”

  “Why not?” the girl screeched, her voice now tinged with anger and panic. “I’d rather leave than have to do this!”

  “Because I’d miss you, Ladybug.” Lauren pushed the hair out of her niece’s eyes. “We’d all miss you. And you running off and living alone on the street isn’t the way to handle this. It would only be worse for you out there.”

  Clarissa defiantly crossed her arms over her chest. “How could it be worse?”

  Lauren leaned back against the couch cushion and gazed at her niece solemnly. “Because pretty young women like you have to do a lot more than eat dinner with thirty-year-old men to survive when you’re out there on the street.”

  Clarissa’s hard face softened.

  “Because using your body to get food to eat and a place to live is the name of the game out there, and it makes girls older than their time. Some of them even turn to drugs and alcohol to forget what they’ve done, to get through the day.”

  Clarissa audibly swallowed.

  Lauren placed her hand over her niece’s. “You don’t want to be like that, do you, Ladybug?”

  “No,” she finally whispered.

  “I didn’t think so.”

  “Then what do I do, Aunt Lauren? I can’t run away and I can’t go out on a date with that guy. I told you that. And Mama won’t listen to me!”

  “Let me handle it.” Lauren smiled as she gave the girl’s hand a reassuring squeeze.

  “What do you mean?”

  Lauren hesitated before she gave Clarissa her answer. She had avoided becoming involved in this even though she thought it was wrong the way that Cynthia was raising Clarissa to follow in her size-seven, gold-digging footsteps. After all, Clarissa was Lauren’s niece, not her daughter, and as long as Cynthia wasn’t putting Clarissa in harm’s way, Lauren felt she had no right to interfere.

  But Lauren’s mindset on the whole issue had changed. Clarissa had come to her for help. The girl had obviously reached her breaking point, and someone needed to speak up for her. It looked like Lauren was going to have to be the one to do it.

  Lauren slowly rose from the couch and reached for the cordless phone. She began to type in her sister’s home number on the phone’s buttons. “I’m going to call your mother and we’ll—”

  “No! No, Aunt Lauren, please don’t do that!” Clarissa shouted as she jumped up from the couch. “She doesn’t know I’m here! She doesn’t even know I left my room! She grounded me when I talked back to her. I had to sneak out to get here!”

  Lauren hung up the phone. “But honey, that’s even more of a reason for me to call her. What if she’s realized you’re gone? She could be worried sick.”

  Clarissa, in a very unladylike manner that would have made her mother cringe, snorted in disgust. “She doesn’t care about me. All she cares about is money and clothes and her stupid cars. She doesn’t give a damn about me!”

  “That’s not true. Your mother loves you, honey.”

  Clarissa didn’t look convinced.

  “She just . . . she just has a bad way of showing it. But no one taught her . . . any of us . . . any better. She’s doing the same thing that was done to her. She doesn’t know any different, that’s all.”

  Clarissa’s pouty lips formed into a grim line.

  “Let me talk to her.” Lauren placed a hand on Clarissa’s shoulder. “At least give me a chance.”

  “It won’t work.”

  “But what do you have to lose if I try?”

  For several seconds, Clarissa didn’t respond. Then after some time, she threw up her hands.

  “Fine,” she mumbled before flopping back onto the couch.

  “Whatever! But I’m telling you, it’s not going to make a difference. She won’t listen.”

  Lauren started to dial Cynthia’s number again, but paused before dialing the last digit. She gazed at her niece, who was nervously biting her recently manicured nails.

  “I think you’re wrong, Ladybug. I really do.”

  She listened as the phone began to ring on the other end.

  “Where is she?” Cynthia asked through clenched teeth as Lauren opened her front door. Cynthia’s hazel eyes, which were rimmed with runny mascara from crying, were now blazing with fury. “Where the hell is she?”

  Lauren held up a hand, hoping to quell her eldest sister’s temper.

  Just as Lauren had suspected, Cynthia had realized after arriving home from her date at the symphony that Clarissa was not in her room. When Lauren called, Cynthia had answered the phone in tears and in panic, blathering about how she had checked every room in the house before finally concluding that Clarissa had, indeed, disappeared. Lauren quickly told Cynthia not to worry; Clarissa was safe at her apartment. Then the line abruptly clicked. Ten minutes later, Cynthia was charging down her front steps. She must have broken the speed limit and run quite a few red lights to make her way across town so quickly.

  “Cindy, please calm down. She’s already scared you’re going to flip out on her. I didn’t call you over here to—”

  Cynthia didn’t let her finish. Instead she barged past Lauren into the apartment, almost knocking her younger sister to the ground. She stomped in her four-inch heels into Lauren’s living room.

  Cynthia hadn’t changed her clothes from her date. She was still dressed in a voluminous white evening gown. Diamond teardrop earrings dangled from her delicate lobes and diamond cuffs were around each wrist. Her lips were painted blood red and her hair was slicked back into a bun at the crown of her head.

  She looks like
the White Witch of Narnia, Lauren thought morosely.

  Clarissa must have thought so, too, for she cowered on the couch under her mother’s glare as if anticipating the moment when Cynthia would turn her into stone with the flick of a concealed wand.

  “Horseback riding lessons,” Cynthia began, her chest rising and falling with each shaky breath she took. “You’ve had them since you were eight years old. Credit cards . . . trips to Disney World, the Bahamas, and Europe . . . you said you wanted a BMW convertible when you get your driver’s license next month. Did I tell you ‘no’?”

  “No,” Clarissa whispered as she shook her bowed head.

  “No, I didn’t, did I?” Cynthia yelled hysterically. “You have everything any girl could ever want and this is the thanks I get? You go sneaking out the window in the middle of the night when I specifically forbade you to leave the house? You run away when I’m only trying to do what’s best for you? That’s the thanks I get? Huh? Answer me!”

  Clarissa didn’t respond. That seemed to anger her mother more.

  “You’re just selfish, Clarissa! You’re a spoiled, selfish, little brat, and I’m tired of—”

  Lauren stepped forward. “Cindy, that’s enough. Stop yelling at her.”

  Like a coiled snake, Cynthia instantly snapped her head to look in her sister’s direction. “Don’t you tell me to stop! Don’t you dare tell me to stop! I’m speaking to my daughter! This has nothing to do with you!”

  “Yes, it does, because she’s my niece as well as your daughter!” Lauren met her sister’s glare with her own. “And I’m not going to stand here and let you call her names when I know she tried to talk to you about how she felt! You just didn’t listen!”

  Cynthia turned back around and scowled at Clarissa. “Wait for me in the car. I’m parked in the lot out front. I need to talk to your aunt in private.”

  Clarissa slowly raised her head. She gazed at her mother with tear-filled eyes. “B-but I . . . I thought—”

  “Wait for me in the car!” Cynthia boomed, making Clarissa jump.